Baby Shower Decorations|DIY Baby Shower Centerpieces

Hello, I'm Jennifer with Jennifer Decorates and today's video is going to be about how to make a baby shower centerpiece, so stay tuned. So my daughter-in-law is having a baby, her first baby, a little girl, and some friends from church are throwing her a shower and of course when they ask for volunteers for decorations, yeah I wanted to do a baby shower centerpiece. So this tutorial is going to be how to make a baby stroller or they used to call them prams and I've worked on this for quite a while and I think you're going to really like it. It's going to be easy to do and I'm going to go step by step. Now I have made a pattern on how to do this and I will have a PDF that you can download. It'll be on my website but what we're going to start with is we're going to start with the foundation of the pram and you could do cardboard but I found cardboard boxes to not be the right size or the cardboard was too thick or too thin. So what I found was, and this is a mat board, you can find it in the art section at the craft store for a big sheet like this. It was $2.99. Of course I went and got it when it was on sale. So the first thing we want to do is we're going to trace the pattern pieces onto this and then we're going to cut it out with an exacto knife. So I've got my pattern pieces traced on here and I put my mat board on a cutting board and you're just going to take your exacto knife and cut out your pattern and then you have your pattern piece. I've got all my pieces cut out and you're only going to need one mat board with this. So what we're going to do is we're going to hot glue all these pieces together. The two pattern pieces you need are the two sides of the pram and then the middle, which is the foundation. Now this is going to be the toughest part of this project but it's not too bad. So you need this to curve. So what you're going to do very gently, so you're going to kind of pop, you'll hear it make a pop sound, and just start, see how that, we're going to make it curve and sometimes when you get to the end it's really easy to tear it but all right and just kind of do just a little bit more. This will make it pliable to go around the curve of the pram. Now I like to use some pins to help hold it in place until the glue dries. So start with one side and you're going to add glue to the edges and then we're going to attach it to the side and we're going to pin it in to hold it. All right we're going to start at the end and just put glue right there on the edge. Kind of do a section at a time if you can but maybe about half. All right and then what you're going to do is have this curve around and hit that hot glue like that but you need those pins to pop in place to help hold everything secure until it dries. Oops went through the side. Pull that back out and go in the middle. Okay I'm going to do it down here and let it curve and you might have to add more glue. There and that's going to hold it in place and I'm going to add just a little bit more glue down here and another pin. You won't want to use these pins again for sewing. I can tell you that there'll be enough glue on them and I'm just going to hold that in place for a minute and then we'll keep moving on. All right I made it around to the end and I've added extra glue. This is where I'm going to hold it till it dries and then I'm just going to do the other side. All right once you've got that one side done it's so much easier to do the next side. Okay I've got this all glued together. Let me stop you for one second. The reason I'm doing the thick mat board is because I'm going to put fresh flowers inside so I really need it to be more sturdy. If you didn't want to do that and you just wanted to maybe just put a blanket inside or something else you could actually do this just out of cardstock or thicker paper. So the last thing is you've got your last three pieces and listen I know this looks like a mess but stick with me we're going to make it look great. What you're going to do is you're going to put your side pieces. See how this goes on the side and then this one over here will go on the side. So what you're going to have to do is take the mat board and we're going to have to do some more bending and gluing. I actually made it through this part of the project without burning my finger for the first time. I'm going to add glue to the curved part. We'll make that umbrella that goes over the top of the pram. I'm just going to repeat the same process. Okay now for the fun part we're going to add the wheels. So in the craft section I found these little toy wheels made of wood and then right next to them were the dowel rods that fit right inside. So your pattern will show you how long your dowel rod needs to be. So I've marked mine and I'm just cutting it with wire cutters. All you're going to do is hot glue each end and just hot glue your little wood wheels on the pram right on it. Even it out so that it's going to sit straight and just glue your wheels underneath right to the pram. But I really want it to look really old and like this piece was found in an antique shop. That's why I haven't cared about a little bit of a hole here or a mix and match. I'm going to make it look really old. Now I found this stuff it's called Dimensional FX. It's by DecoArt and I found it in the paint section in the craft store. So it's what it's going to do it's going to texturize the pram and it's pretty thick and I've just got a little putty knife and all I'm going to do and I'm not going to try to be perfect I want this to look like a found piece and I'm just going to put it all over. I'm not putting it in the inside of the pram because I'm going to place flowers inside. So I'm only doing the outside and if you kind of think of frosting a cake that's really all I'm doing and I'm not trying to make it look perfect. All the texturizing is done and dry so now I am going to age this. My go-to acrylic paint color is burnt umber. Whenever I'm aging anything you just want to water it down a little bit and then the trick is to have just a little bit of a damp paper towel so that you can wipe it off. So this is how I age something. I'm just going to kind of rub it on a little bit and before it dries I'm going to rub it in and then if I feel like I've got too much brown then I wet my paper towel even more. I really just want a little bit of an aged look not a lot. See very easy and then you just kind of do that all the way around until it's all the same aged look all the way around. Next you just want to paint the wheels and I'm going to paint them brown because I kind of want them to stand out a little bit and just use acrylic paint and a small brush and you got it. Okay, do you ever squirrel when you're in the middle of doing a craft project? I squirrel all the time anytime but what I found was this really pretty lace in my closet and I thought you know what I am just going to put some lace just on the top of the pram. I guess you call that the umbrella part. I don't know but I'm going to glue it from here to here all the way across and just cover the top of this. So now is really the fun part. The last thing I'm going to do I'm going to add some of this really pretty lace trim around all of the edges to give it a finished look and then I'm going to hot glue a couple little buttons on the side and then we're going to put the flowers inside. Okay now for the really fun part is to put the flowers inside. Now I found a really the perfect size little plastic container to hold my foam. Now you want to use the foam that is for real flowers not for artificial flowers and you soak it in water for quite a while and then it will soak up and hold water for your fresh flowers to look great. Now I need to add a little bit of newspaper inside because I kind of want to build it up a little bit. I'm just going to set a little bit very gently in there. Now let me show you. So I just set that down inside and now I'm going to place different flowers. Now that I've got that set in there I'm ready to kind of make my floral arrangement inside of this cute little pram. Fun fact so I went to Kroger to get my flowers and I had them all picked out and the florist that works there came over and said hey is there anything I can help you with and I said no I'm good I'm just getting flowers together. I was just kind of looking for a filler and she said well do you like sedum? Uh yeah. She goes well I keep that in the back. Um we don't sell it I just buy it so that I can make my own floral arrangements. Okay never knew there was a storage of really cool filler in the back so FYI ask they may have it back there. Okay so the first flower I want to start with I'm gonna start I usually go with the largest flowers first and then middle size and then small and I'm just gonna fill this up with flowers. I don't think there's going to be a wrong way to do it. I mean look at these beautiful little soft pink roses. I love them. So I really like the softness um that these roses add and the carnations are just a little bit pinker than I want so I'm going to use those in other decorations for the shower but I'm going to add the sedum. Well I hope you enjoyed this video. Listen make this baby shower center piece your own design. Maybe some of you don't want to go to as much detail as I did. I just find my happy place in crafting but go to my website and just download the pdf so that you could do a pattern and kind of do your own thing. Be sure to subscribe to my channel because I'm going to have a lot more fun videos coming out and I hope you have a wonderful day.